


Game Night

by Arelithil



Series: The Secret Life of Holos [4]
Category: Star Trek: Picard
Genre: Fluff and Humor, Friendship, Gen, Podfic Available, SO MUCH FLUFF, Slice of Life
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-14
Updated: 2020-05-14
Packaged: 2021-03-02 17:21:43
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,458
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24180502
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Arelithil/pseuds/Arelithil
Summary: Roaming the halls ofLa Sirenaat 4am one night, Raffi makes a strange discovery on the holodeck.Now withPodficby the inimitable Thimblerig!
Relationships: Raffi Musiker & La Sirena's Emergency Holograms
Series: The Secret Life of Holos [4]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1799299
Comments: 18
Kudos: 19





	Game Night

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Regionalpancake](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Regionalpancake/gifts).



> Based on a prompt I gave Regionalpancake for their _Downtime_ drabble collection and then liked so much I had to write something for it myself, too. Can’t wait for their take on the same prompt =D
> 
> This fic owes quite a bit to Thimblerig’s breathtakingly brilliant Series _On the Decks of La Sirena_ , especially _Best Boy_ and _Prayer for Peace_. But you should go and read all of it because IT! IS! AMAZING!!!
> 
> Thanks as always to my amazing beta reader Horizon who is kind enough to laugh at all of my jokes! Find her beautiful art over on [her tumblr](https://horizonproblems.tumblr.com/)
> 
>  **Update:** REGIONALPANCAKE DREW [BRILLIANT FANART](https://archiveofourown.org/works/24326584) FOR THIS STORY!!! I am _completely_ blown away!!!
> 
>  **Next update:** THIMBLERIG MADE A PODFIC OUT OF THIS STORY!!! WAAAHH! It is extremely excellent and I can only recommend it! (Link in the summary)

The cool semi-darkness of ship’s night seemed to amplify the ambient hum of the warp drive as it reverberated around the empty corridors. It could be difficult to keep track of time in deep space, and at any given moment, _La Sirena_ was not exactly brightly-lit - at least not compared to your average short-to-medium-range public transporter, let alone the sparkly gleam of a Starfleet vessel. When this ship shifted to night mode, it mostly meant that half the ambient light sources flickered off and the omnipresent holo-displays went on standby unless you actively called them up.

It was all the more surprising, therefore, that the control panel outside the holodeck was glowing in gentle orange tones, indicating that someone was running a program.

Raffi frowned. She had spent most of the day immersed in the depths of a particularly juicy conspiracy that supposedly explained some of the more troubling recent diplomatic failures in the Ithro-Sector. After running down a number of promising leads, she finally had to concede that at the bottom of this theory, there was nothing more than a mixture of petty bureaucrats trying to hide their own failures and inept diplomats trying to save face. By that time, however, it was already well past 3am, she had drunk enough coffee to send her heart into warp drive, and the incessant hum of the engines was making her skin crawl. She had hoped taking a stroll around the nightly corridors might help calm her, but as she stepped out of her quarters, the glowing controls across the deck caught her attention.

Who else could be awake at this hour? Her first thought was Rios, but he barely ever used the holodeck, preferring to spend his sleepless nights kicking balls around or getting thoroughly thrashed by Emmet in whatever style of combat was that month’s flavor. But everybody else should really be asleep right now!

Raffi sidled closer, trying to stay out of the entrance’s sensor field. She did not want to give herself away if whoever was inside had not engaged privacy protocols and her approach triggered the door’s automatic release mechanism. She tried to take shallow breaths for a few moments and strained her ears, but she should have known better. The holodeck was one of the few rooms on board that was actually soundproof, so no matter how hard she listened, she would never hear a noise through the thick bulkheads.

Raffi hesitated for a long moment, then she forced herself to turn around and head towards the stairs to the lower deck. She did not need to know who was enjoying a bit of downtime in there, did she? They were clearly trying to keep their activities discreet, if not secret. Running some holoprogram at nearly 4am. Without anyone’s knowledge.

Less than two minutes later, Raffi was tiptoeing towards the holodeck keeping her gaze fixed on the display next to the door. Any embarrassment she might have felt for sneaking around the deserted ship like a teenager returning late from an illicit party got hastily stuffed away under a blanket of unbearable curiosity and caffeine jitters. Fortunately, the warp drive was running on autopilot so there was no need for Enoch to man the helm. Not that the ENH would have judged her if he had seen her slinking along the walls, he might even have joined her little investigation. But right now, she was grateful she did not have to come up with some semi-plausible excuse for her behavior. The plain truth of the matter was that for Raffi, coming down from a research-high always felt like a crash into a black void of apathy and pointlessness, so anything that could keep her mind engaged for a little longer was preferable to that.

The holodeck’s external display welcomed her with an enticing stream of procedural data. Raffi’s fingers flew over the controls, decades of muscle memory compensating for the shakiness of over-caffeination, but after a moment, her face puckered in another frown. The readings indicated that nobody was using the holodeck at the moment. There was a program running, something creatively titled ‘defrgm 5H/8.12T’, but according to the information rushing by under Raffi’s fingertips, it seemed to have been triggered by one of _La Sirena’s_ own subroutines.

Raffi’s frown deepened. Whoever had designed this program had very deliberately obfuscated its purpose. There was practically no documentation, and any metadata she could dig out of the code was cryptic to the point of uselessness. Her only hint came from the holodeck’s log which indicated that the same program had been run with some regularity for well over four months now. Always late at night and never for more than three hours, but it was definitely the same program, even if the numbering changed with each instance. Raffi scrolled down the list of recent activations and tried to discern any pattern in the varying digits. 5H/7.12T; 4T/12; 5M/9.11N… To the casual observer it might have looked like standard nomenclature for a defrag-routine, but the numbers simply did not make any sense!

Raffi’s fingers twitched and she could feel a shiver running down her spine. This was probably just some errant maintenance program, activating whenever the buffers needed a good scrubbing, nothing more. Certainly nothing sinister. Right?

Her heartbeat, already thudding too loudly with the effort to pump blood that was 50% black coffee, accelerated as she reached for the door-release.

A crash of light and noise spilled into the silence of the sleeping ship. Raffi balked as the commotion overloaded her senses and it took a long moment for her eyes and ears to adjust.

A glowing orange sun was setting over a calm ocean, casting golden light on a vast, tropical beach. From where she stood at the side of the door, Raffi could see the gentle curve of the coastline rising into a jungle-covered mountain range, its peaks hidden in pink and orange clouds. The sound of waves and the distant call of birds mixed with a rhythmic music she could not identify, but the ambient soundscape was eclipsed by the loud bickering of five near-identical voices.

Flooded with a sudden mix of relief and trepidation, Raffi took a careful step until she was fully in the open doorway and then her jaw dropped as she struggled to process the sight that presented itself.

On a small wooden deck, barely rising above the white sand, stood a large table, illuminated by the setting sun and a string of colorful lanterns. _La Sirena’s_ five Emergency Holograms were spread around it, each seated in a differently styled cane chair, and they were so deep in a heated argument that they had yet to notice her sudden intrusion. The sheer absurdity of the scene seemed to have misaligned the circuits in Raffi’s brain, and she found herself incapable of forming a coherent thought. Meanwhile, her eyes and ears kept chugging on, merrily cataloguing all of the incongruous details.

“We need to establish a route so that we can safely find our way back.” Enoch sounded as chipper as ever. He had a giant white and orange blossom tucked behind one ear and was smiling encouragingly at his fellow holograms.

Next to him, Ian tapped his chin, apparently deep in thought. The EEH had swapped his usual grey turtleneck for a short-sleeved shirt with a print so vibrant it made Raffi’s eyes water, though he was still wearing the knit hat. “I dinnae ken if we have the resources for that yet…”

“But shouldn’t that be our priority?” Enoch looked at the others, fishing for support.

Emmet shook his head and mumbled something Spanish that earned him a round of loud protest from the table.

“We can’t just beat every problem into submission!”, the Hospitality Hologram, a broad-brimmed straw hat set at a rakish angle atop his slicked-back hair, griped in a tone that implied this was not the first time he had had to voice that particular complaint. “They were way too strong and we would have been wiped out in an instant! Not every successful strategy involves combat.”

There was some more back and forth but finally, the EMH’s crisp accent cut through the din: “Alright, alright! Those are all excellent points.” He had his back to the door, but Raffi could see a collection of exotically shaped cocktail glasses near his left hand, empty but for a residue of paper umbrellas, toothpicks and illogically twisted straws. Whatever the holograms were doing, they had been at it for a while. “But we need to focus on the rescue mission!”

The words ‘rescue mission’ finally caught Raffi’s frayed attention and her focus snapped to Emil, as he continued: “If we wait any longer or try to get help, we’ll never get to the settlers before their ship is destroyed!” The urgency in his voice was completely at odds with the cheery surroundings and the jarring contrast was enough to shake Raffi out of her stupor.

She crossed the distance to the table in a few long strides and barked: “What the hell is going on here? Did we receive a distress call from another ship? Why haven’t you called any of us?”

Five pairs of identical brown eyes stared up at her with varying degrees of surprise. Or rather four brown pairs, since Emil’s eyes were tinged a beautiful shade of pink by his star-shaped sunglasses. The sight was deeply disconcerting, and Raffi quickly let her gaze roam over the large table instead, hoping to find any clues about the nature of the current crisis. A large cardboard map, depicting a number of islands surrounded by ocean, lay in the center and there was a truly ludicrous number of colorful wooden tokens of all shapes and sizes scattered across its surface as well as across several adjoining cardboard pieces marked with cryptic diagrams. Brightly illustrated decks of cards lay grouped at various points and there was a tableau of more cardboard, wooden tokens, and cards in front of each of the five holograms.

Raffi’s racing thoughts screeched to a halt with a sudden realization, which was confirmed mere seconds later when Emmet broke out into raucous laughter.

“ _¡Buenas noches, Araña!_ ” He managed between wheezes. “Wanna join our game?”

Raffi felt hot blood rushing into her head, setting her cheeks on fire.

The Hospitality Hologram had quickly gotten out of his chair and was smiling at her. “Ms. Musiker! What a pleasant surprise! I’m terribly sorry about the misunderstanding, I hope we didn’t cause you too much concern.”

Raffi blinked, trying to regain control over her voice. “You’re… playing a game?”

“Yes, a traditional cooperative style of Terran boardgames”, the Steward explained eagerly. “We have taken the roles of explorers on a deserted island, trying to accomplish different missions while protecting the base camp.”

His words nearly got drowned out by the blood whooshing in Raffi’s ears. This was too much for her agitated brain to process! There was a stout glass with a couple fingers of amber liquid in front of Ian, just to her right, and she grabbed it and downed it in one. Surprisingly, it was synthehol, not just a holoprojection that vaguely tasted like alcohol, and while not as potent as real whiskey, it still had some of that pleasant burn.

“Whoa there”, the engineer said with a grin, “slow down, lassie, we winnae want ye tae get plastered!”

Raffi just stared at him, unsure whether it was his thick accent or the mix of adrenaline and embarrassment that made his words impossible to parse. A gentle hand landed on her left elbow and she spun around with a startled jerk.

Emil had stood up and was looking at her, his warm eyes (which were mercifully no longer hidden behind pink glasses) sparkling with amusement and concern. “I think you should have a seat.” Before Raffi could protest, the EMH steered her towards the only unoccupied chair, which happened to be next to Emmet.

Steward hurried to pull the chair back and the sudden motion caused several large metal objects to clatter off the seat onto the wooden deck. The EHH huffed. “You know”, he said, skewering Emmet with an accusatory glance, “when I asked you to put those away, this is not what I had in mind!”

Raffi stared at the mess on the floor and felt a hysterical giggle rising to her throat. “Are those… machetes?”

Emmet shrugged. “He said to dress for the occasion”, he drawled, waving a languid hand in Steward’s direction.

“’The occasion’ being an ocean-side get-together on a tropical island!”, the other hologram shot back.

“A jungle island”, Emmet corrected, still utterly unfazed by the pile of weapons at his feet.

Steward launched into another complaint, but Emil had clearly reached the end of his patience. At a snap of his fingers, the blades disappeared which gave him the space to deposit Raffi in the large cane chair. He crouched down in front of her and closed a room-temperature hand around her wrist. “If I may ask, what brings you here at this time of night?”

His steady gaze and gentle touch were grounding, and Raffi managed to tune out the bickering that was still going on behind her and sort her thoughts into something resembling coherence. “I noticed the program running but I couldn’t figure out what it was for, so I thought I’d better investigate.” At the thought of the strange code, her initial curiosity managed to dig its way out from under the confusion and shock of the last few minutes and Raffi leaned forward in her chair. “The log said the holodeck was activated by a computer subroutine. I’m guessing that was one of you?”

The answer came from Enoch, who appeared next to her with a steaming cup of something smelling vaguely sweet and herbal. “Today was Steward’s turn to set up, since he won last time around.”

Raffi looked up at him. “Last time? So, the previous instances of this program… that was always the five of you?”

Enoch nodded eagerly. “Or four of us, when someone is needed elsewhere, but we’re careful to make that clear in the log.”

Raffi could feel pieces falling in place as her mind was scanning all the information she had amassed so far. “The non-sequential numbering! The first digit records how many of you were present and the rest… is that some system for keeping score?”

Enoch beamed at her. “Yes exactly! Ian came up with it, it’s really very clever!”

“Ach”, the EEH said modestly, “it only tracks the most recent winner and the current champion, since otherwise it would deviate too much from the standard nomenclature.” Raffi noticed he was making an effort to speak more clearly.

“But those are the important ones! The rest is easy enough to keep track of between game nights.” In his eagerness to reassure his fellow hologram, Enoch nearly spilled the tea he was still clutching. Flustered, he held it out to Raffi. “I thought you might like this.”

Raffi smiled at him. “Thanks, honey, but I think I’d prefer another whiskey.”

“I’m sure you would”, Emil said and smoothly plucked the teacup out of Enoch’s hand to press it into Raffi’s. She wanted to object to this condescending treatment, but his stern look made her falter. Of all the holograms, the EMH had inherited the greatest share of the commanding presence that had made Rios such an excellent Starfleet officer. Now he raised his eyebrows critically. “Dare I ask how many cups of coffee you’ve had in the last 26 hours?”

Raffi shrugged, feeling a little sheepish. “I stopped counting at some point.”

“After…?”

“… Six.”

Emil shook his head with a beleaguered sigh, and Raffi decided to quickly change the subject.

“So, what’s with all the cloak and dagger?”, she asked, looking around at them. “You’ve been having these little meetings for months, right? Are you trying to hide them from Rios?”

Enoch looked a little guilty. “We’re not _hiding_ , exactly, we just…” He looked to Steward for help.

The Hospitality Hologram sat down on the arm of Emmet’s chair with a regretful expression. “We were concerned that it might… unduly disturb the captain’s peace of mind if we informed him of our game nights.”

“Aye”, Ian agreed. “He knows we can activate and deactivate ourselves, of course, but he prefers not to think about it.”

Raffi snorted. That was actually a pretty solid reason. Although there had been a bit of détente between them recently, Cris’s relationship with his holographic lookalikes was still rather strained and she could not imagine her friend enjoying the thought of them getting together after hours to play boardgames and gossip.

“It’s not like we’re lying to the captain”, Enoch said, “We’d love to have him join us, even, but the last time one of us suggested maybe playing a round of cards one night, he said he’d rather wrestle a drunk Klingon.”

Emmet crossed his arms. “He has enough people to worry about now”, he said, sounding a little annoyed that the others were badmouthing Rios. “Doesn’t need us to bother him, too.”

Steward picked a bit of invisible fluff off Emmet’s shoulder. “It just seemed more prudent to make our little outings appear unobtrusive, should Captain Rios ever choose to check the holodeck logs.”

Raffi considered them all for a moment. Over time, she had really grown to like these holograms and it was clear to anyone but Rios that they were far more than simple support routines. What gave him or her or anyone the right to deny them this little indulgence? Finally, she shook her head. “Well, Cris is not the only person on this ship anymore and I for one would love a good round of poker sometime!” Enoch’s face lit up at her declaration, and she gave him a warm smile. “And if he has a problem with that, I’ll give him a piece of my mind.”

Emil squeezed her wrist and flashed her a smile, but then he got up and his expression turned ironic. “Just tell him if he cancels game nights, Enoch will get bored and start looking for stimulating conversation whenever they’re working together. That should be an effective enough threat.” The ENH made an indignant sound and swatted at the other hologram’s shoulder, but they were all laughing now.

Finally, the EMH cocked his head and looked down at Raffi again. “I don’t suppose I can convince you to go to bed?”

She shot him an apologetic smile. “Sorry, Doc, I don’t think there’ll be a lot of sleep for me tonight.”

“Right.” He straightened his back and looked around the table. “In that case I hope you’ll help me explain to these heathens why we shouldn’t just let a poor, defenseless family of settlers drown when we are perfectly capable of saving them!”

“May I remind you”, Steward huffed, “that last time, your near-pathological need to help everyone who seems even a little inconvenienced got us all killed?”

“That situation was completely different.” Emil tried to wave off the accusation, but he was clearly embarrassed.

Raffi sat up a little straighter and raised her eyebrows. “What happened last time?”

Ian, who had started shuffling a few of the card decks, chuckled quietly. “Well, in that game, we were supposed to explore a haunted mansion. In one of the first rooms we found a little girl and Emil said we needed to help her. So, she led us into the basement and, well…”

“She turned into a giant monster and ate us all”, Emmet finished for him with a sardonic smile.

“Well, how was I supposed to know that would happen?”, the EMH asked defensively. “She was just a child and the card said she was crying!”

Enoch grinned broadly. “To be fair, the card also said that she was eerie and there was ominous light emanating from her.”

Emil looked like he wanted to respond, but Steward interrupted him. “I spent three days creating a fittingly spooky ambiance for the occasion”, he sniffed, “and then the game was over in five minutes.”

“The glitches in the holomatrix you could only see from the corner of your eye were a nice touch”, Ian said in a consoling tone. “I found them very scary.”

Emil rolled his eyes.

Raffi followed their exchange with growing fascination. “You’re saying you design a new setting for every game you play?”

“Only one per night”, Enoch reassured her.

“That’s still more holo programming than I’ve ever managed to scrape together.”

The Hospitality Hologram adjusted the angle of his hat. “Everyone should dress for the occasion”, he explained, “Including _La Sirena_.”

Raffi chuckled. “I guess that make sense. And do you play only cooperative games?”

Apparently, she had hit a sore spot because the holograms all hesitated and exchanged quick looks, except for Emmet, who closed his eyes and slouched lower in his chair.

Finally, Ian cleared his throat. “Well, you see, we had a wee bit of trouble in the beginning, finding games that… suited all of our talents equally.” Everyone’s eyes darted to Emmet, whose lips twitched in a smug smile. “Eventually, we decided to spend most of the evening with a game we could all contribute to and then just have a little something competitive at the end. For fun.”

Raffi felt like she could ask a thousand more questions, but Emil clapped his hands. “Speaking of fun, gentlemen, can we please return to the task at hand?”

There was a general murmur of consent and one by one, they all settled back in their places and resumed the game. Raffi tried to follow along and pick up the rules, though it seemed to her the game consisted mostly of lengthy debates about priorities and strategy.

It was fascinating to see the five of them interact like this, outside their usual roles and parameters. The game brought out pieces of Cris in them that she had never noticed before. It took her less than five minutes to ascertain that Enoch had inherited her friend’s fierce competitive streak, though the hologram made sure not to let it spoil his fun. And when one of their hunting expeditions ended in a gory disaster, usually mild-mannered Ian let out a string of curses that made Raffi glad she could not understand his accent. It was a bizarre kind of family resemblance where they all clearly shared a lot of whatever the hologram equivalent of DNA was, but it expressed itself in very different ways.

Across the table from her, Emil had procured another cocktail that fluoresced in a violent shade of turquoise. When he noticed her pointed look, he simply declared: “I’m off duty”, and put his pink sunglasses back on.

Raffi leaned back in her chair with a grin and breathed in the fragrant sea breeze. The sun had barely moved in the sky and its orange light was warming her neck and back even through the chair. The gentle rumbling of the waves combined with the lilting music into a soothing harmony that finally managed to calm her agitated mind. She wondered idly when she had last spent time relaxing by the seaside. It felt like ages ago!

At some point, Steward took the mug of tea she had abandoned on the table and then forgotten about until it was too cold to drink and went to get her a new one.

Raffi accepted the mug, thanking the hologram for the gesture more than the beverage, and took a careful sip. Surprisingly, it was actually rather delicious, rich and sweet and instantly warming her to her core. It reminded her of the tea she had made for her son whenever he woke up screaming from a nightmare. That had been when he was very young, of course, when she was still working in Starfleet Intelligence. The memory brought a sudden pang of longing and regret, and she quickly tried to hide it by taking another sip of tea. From the corner of her eye, she noticed that Emmet was watching her, with an inscrutable look. The ETH was the hardest of the five to read and she was not sure what to expect when he sat up a little and put his hand on the table in front of her. There was the slight glint of something holographic snapping into existence under his palm, and then he pulled his hand away to reveal a bracelet of small shells, strung together artfully with green strands that resembled miniature seaweed.

Raffi stared at the bracelet, then stared up at Emmet. He held her gaze for a moment, then he shrugged. “Everyone should dress for the occasion.” He slunk deeper in his chair with a grin, his leg lightly pressing against hers under the table as if by accident. Raffi let out a long breath, then she took the bracelet and slipped it on.

If the other holos had noticed the short exchange, they did not show it. Right now, they were planning another harrowing rescue mission, occasionally devolving into loud arguments. Despite all their bickering, it was very obvious that they all deeply cared about one another. There were no grand gestures or declarations, but Raffi could see it in the little moments between them. In how Steward kept a constant supply of everyone’s favorite snacks and drinks on the table - while Emmet surreptitiously refilled the EHH’s glass whenever he was looking elsewhere. In the way Enoch defused any argument that was threatening to become too intense with a well-timed joke or a gentle nudge. In the fact that whenever someone was looking for a specific die or deck of cards or a bottle opener, Emil had already anticipated it and handed them whatever they needed. In the way Ian quietly and competently made sure the game kept moving along and enforced the rules with so much good humor that nobody ever resented it.

Sitting among the five of them, drinking sweet tea, listening to the ocean, Raffi could feel all the tension of the day and the shadow of the painful memories slowly drain away. She closed her eyes, exhaustion finally setting in, and someone took the empty cup from her limp fingers. The back of her chair slowly tilted backwards, and something unfolded from underneath it to prop up her legs. She wondered for a moment whether she should protest being fussed over like this, but then someone spread a soft blanket over her, and any conscious thoughts faded from her mind, leaving her with a deep feeling of calm and warmth and belonging.

**Author's Note:**

> I know Ian would spell his drink “Whisky”, but since Raffi is (as far as we know) American, I went with the US spelling here.
> 
> Credit to Thimblerig for coming up with Emmet's brilliant nickname for Raffi!
> 
> This was supposed to be a bit of silly fun, but somehow it started out as a mystery, turned into something of a crack fic, and then ended with a surprising amount of unabashed fluff. What can I say? These are strange times and my brain apparently has a lot of Feelings it needs to project on fictional characters ;]
> 
> If anyone is curious which route Raffi might be taking exactly to sneak towards the holodeck, I have started a little project to try and figure out the layout of _La Sirena_. You can find what I've discovered so far [on tumblr](https://mappinglasirena.tumblr.com/).


End file.
